


Icicle

by rudbeckia



Series: Random Worlds [8]
Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Break Up Talk, Established Relationship, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-01
Updated: 2017-08-01
Packaged: 2018-12-09 17:50:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,455
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11674095
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rudbeckia/pseuds/rudbeckia
Summary: It's breaking point in Ben and Armitage's relationship. Do they stay together as a resentful old couple, or is there a better solution to the problem of them having grown apart?





	Icicle

Armitage drove slowly around the last bend and into the cul-de-sac where his house sat. Their house. It was a 1970s build for aspirational young families: two bedrooms and a “nursery” converted to a home office, detached, taller than it was wide, boxy but neat with a small rectangle of grass in front, a larger one out back and a driveway long enough for two cars.

The driveway was empty. Armitage sighed in relief at the simple pleasure of having the house to himself for however long it took for his husband to get home, his mind flashing an image of himself snug in the living room watching some trash TV with a glass of wine that nobody would look at him disapprovingly for pouring before dinner on a tough day. He pulled up the driveway, unlocked the cover of the charger set into a post at the side of the house and plugged his car in.

He let himself in the front door, dropped his keys and bag on what would have been the _telephone table_ more than half a century ago and went left, through the open plan living/dining area to the slim kitchen that occupied the back corner of the house, crammed behind the understair cupboard. He cursed. The sink was full of dishes and the little dishwasher blinked a red light at him.

_Can he not even manage… fuck it I should leave it… I could go out again and come home later… Ugh_

Sighing and muttering, Armitage opened the dishwasher, moved the pan whose handle prevented the arm from rotating and closed it again. The machine started up with a gurgle and a whine.

A scratch at the back door and an orange shape distorted through the patterned privacy glass made Armitage curse again. He unlocked the door and a cat strolled in stiffly and told him off with a series of meow-ow-ows.

“Oh Millie, I’m sorry baby. Did he forget to get you in? Here, you must be a hungry kitty.”  
Armitage opened the cat cupboard and fished out a can of no-drain tuna. He opened it with Millie twining around his legs, suddenly all purrs and insistent soft chirrups. He mashed some into a cat bowl and put it down, stroking Millie’s bony head.  
“You’re losing weight, old girl!” Armitage watched his beloved cat for a few seconds then scraped the remaining tuna into a tub and put it back in the cupboard for later. Millie didn’t like her tuna cold.

Three was half a bottle of Chenin Blanc left over from yesterday in the fridge. Armitage poured a large glass and headed upstairs to change, pausing to put a second bottle from the wine rack in the understair cupboard into the fridge to chill for later.

He was halfway through an episode of Deep Space Nine and a second glass of leftover wine when another car pulled into the driveway. The door opened and keys crashed onto the table, the door closed and a voice called out.  
“Honey I’m ho-o-ome!”

“In here,” Armitage called, and Ben’s face peered around the door.  
“You didn’t waste time!” Ben pointed at the glass in Armitage’s hand.  
Armitage defended himself with an attack. “You almost broke the dishwasher again and you left Millie out all day. She’s twenty-two! You know she can’t run away if a fox chases her or something.”  
“Well you shouldn’t have let her out then!” Ben’s mood had soured immediately. “Maybe I should try going out and coming in again and see if I get a nicer welcome.”  
“Good fucking luck.” Armitage scowled at the TV then clicked it off. He sat watching the blank screen while Ben thumped upstairs to change.

Armitage sighed at the almost empty wine glass in his hand. He’d definitely had too much wine to be able to storm out and drive away. Besides, the impact of a flounce would be lost when he had to ask his husband to shift his car first. He put the glass on the grey tiled hearth in front of the electric fire, got up and plodded after Ben.

Ben was in the master bedroom, sitting on the bed and staring into space. Armitage felt a pang of some unidentifiable emotion. This was his man, his choice of who to spend his life with. He’d said those words almost two decades ago: for better, for worse, in sickness and in health, until—

“Sorry, babe.” Ben’s voice was deep and soft.  
“It’s fine.” Armitage wondered for a few seconds what he should say now. He settled on, “Sorry I snapped at you.”  
“It’s fine.” Ben stood up and hung up his suit. He reached for his sweatpants but instead of shaking them out and pulling them on, he gripped the garment in both fists, pulling at the fabric. He glared at Armitage. “Actually, it’s not fine. It’s every fucking day. I’m fucking tired of having to live with an icicle. You make me feel like everything I do is an inconvenience.”

Armitage felt nauseous and his head spun. Without a word, he turned and went into the spare bedroom, closing the door behind him, sitting on the floor and leaning against it. He could go for a walk. He could call a cab. He could take the bus into town and—

_—not come back_

He’d finished sobbing by the time Ben tapped at the door and spoke, voice muffled through the white-painted plywood.  
“You okay?”  
“Yes!” He knew he sounded defensive. Armitage wiped at his face again, also knowing that he looked a mess and didn't want Ben to see.  
“I’m ordering pizza. Want some?”  
“Yes please.”  
“Okay, it’ll be about forty minutes.”  
Ben’s feet were heavy on the stairs. Armitage escaped to the bathroom and started up the shower.

_it’s my fault it’s my fault it’s my fault it’s_

 

Downstairs. Armitage sat on the sofa in clean pyjamas with a can of diet coke while Ben emptied the dishwasher and cooed at Millie who purred over another forkful of tuna. Two slices of pizza remained and Armitage had already bagsied them for his packed lunch before Ben designated them “free snack food that I don’t really want but will eat anyway to save waste and then complain because I ate too much”. He picked up the box and went to the kitchen to wrap them.

“I wondered—“  
“I know—“  
“Sorry, you first,” Ben smiled over his shoulder at his husband.  
Armitage sighed into the fridge as he laid the slices flat on a shelf. He _would_ say this.  
“I wondered if I should move into the spare room.” He closed the fridge door and glanced at Ben. “Your turn.”  
Ben didn’t look up. “I know you don’t love me any more and it’s okay. It happens, I guess.”  
Armitage thought for a minute. Was it true? He replied with a soft, “Oh.”  
“Is there someone else?” Ben’s voice remained neutral, controlled.  
“No.” Armitage sighed again. “It’s not that I don’t _love_ you, it’s just… I don’t even know. We’re not the same people any more.”  
“Maybe,” Ben studied the worktop then grabbed a cloth and kitchen spray, “maybe we should call it quits before we turn into that bitter old couple that can’t stand each other but stay together anyway just to piss each other off.”  
“Like the Snokes?” Armitage grinned and Ben sniggered.

Ben opened the second bottle of wine and poured two glasses. Armitage followed him back to the sofa.  
“Arm, can I show you something and you promise not to get upset?”  
“Uh?” Armitage looked across the sofa at Ben, who sat at the opposite end with his feet up. Ben reached for his tablet and loaded a web page. He handed it to Armitage.  
“I look, from time to time. Things have been bad for us for a year or two now. I wasn’t exactly looking to move, but I saw this while I was waiting for the pizza.”  
Armitage looked. It was a property for sale: a house split into two flats. Ben watched Armitage frown and sighed.  
“I just thought we could have one each, you know? Live close but not together.”  
Feeling light for the first time in more months than he could count, Armitage handed the tablet back to Ben and nodded.  
“I suppose there’s no harm in looking.”

 

Later in bed, in _my room,_ Armitage lay sleepless but without the racing fears that he used wine to dull. Ben slept in the room just through the wall. He pulled up the details of the house again on his phone and smiled. It even had a garden for a geriatric cat to snooze in on good days.


End file.
